Historical Novel

Paperback Books

Short Stories

About Dennis Herrick

I'm the author of the historical novel Winter of the Metal People: The untold story of America’s first Indian war. That book is featured in the Wikipedia article about me.

We've always had the Spanish version of the story about the Coronado expedition and Tiguex War, but the more I researched the war I realized that the Pueblo side of the story had never been told. It's impossible to understand such a major event without both perspectives, so my historical novel presents the details from the Indian point of view for the first time, featuring the little-known historical figure of the Puebloan leader, Xauían, the first native hero of more than three and a half centuries of the Indian wars in the U.S.

Sunbury Press published Winter of the Metal People originally in 2013, and then in 2017 it published a second edition complete with endnotes and a glossary.

Sunbury Press also published in 2014 my second novel, A Brother's Cold Case, which is a mystery based in Albuquerque. In 2016, Moonshine Cove published my sci-fi novel, War of the Planet Burners.

Click on any cover of a book or short story at the left to read some details of those books or my short stories, many of which focus on modern Puebloans.

My writings about the Pueblo people won the 2004 Tony Hillerman Mystery Short Story Contest and the 2010 Society of Southwestern Writers contest. Some have been previously published in Cowboys & Indians magazine, Storyteller magazine, and the Wapsipinicon Almanac, a Midwestern literary journal.

My experience includes being a former daily newspaper reporter, a former weekly newspaper publisher and owner, and a member of the journalism faculty at the University of New Mexico, where I retired with emeritus status.

Appearances in addition to bookstore signings:
* Presentation about Winter of the Metal People and the Coronado expedition at Desert Ridge Middle School, Albuquerque
* Presentation about Winter of the Metal People and the Coronado expedition at Santa Fe Indian School
* Instructor, "How to Write a Mystery Novel," Continuing Education, University of New Mexico
* Article on the research, writing and marketing of Winter of the Metal People in issue of RoundupMagazine, Western Writers of America
* Lecture, "The Coronado Expedition to Albuquerque," Lew Wallace Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution
* Presentation about Tiguex War for the Stories of New Mexico Program, University of New Mexico
* Nonfiction article, "The Indian Who Defied Coronado," available on this site
* Article, "Xauían and the Tiguex War," Native Peoples Magazine
* Presentation about the Coronado Expedition, Alegria community at Del Webb, Bernalillo
* Article, "The Puebloan View of a Lesser-Known War," New Mexico Mercury
* Presentation about Coronado Expedition to New Mexico and Arizona, Western National Parks Association, Tucson
* Presentation about Coronado and the Tiguex War, Friends of Coronado Historic Site
* Presentation, "Xauían: Forgotten Pueblo Leader," Historical Society of New Mexico
* Presentation about Coronado and the Tiguex War, Continuing Education, University of New Mexico
* Presentation about Coronado and the Tiguex War, Albuquerque Oasis Senior Programs

If you have a question about any of my writings, or a question about Pueblo Indians in general, just send me an e-mail through this site's "Contact" tab.